Recent reviews by Dangeresque

I'd like to preface this review by saying this: I have NEVER played the original release of Neverwinter Nights. I've wanted to and almost did order an old copy online, but part of me just didn't feel like paying 20 bucks for an old game. When I saw the "Enhanced Edition" on sale for about 7 bucks, I knew I had to finally give it a shot! I even sold a bunch of Steam cards and used them to buy some of the extra DLC add-ons.

However, I want this review to be for the base game and the stuff that comes with, so let's focus on that. Neverwinter Nights is an old-school CRPG in the vein of Baldur's Gate or Planescape Torment. It takes place in the Neverwinter setting of Dungeons & Dragons and thrusts you into the role of a custom adventurer. The main story of the game is pretty bland, but I think most people know this already.

The main story is bare bones and basic and the entire first act consists of you running around a town and engaging in weird side-missions in order to capture a bunch of escaped monsters. Pretty dry stuff, if you ask me. It gets a little more complex and interesting later on, but I feel it's not really worth trudging through. What is worth trudging through is the additional content! You have three plug-ins and two full-on expansion packs, all of which have better stories and scenarios than the main quest.

The gameplay itself is pretty basic. You equip different weapons and armor, cast spells, and frequently pause your game to strategize. It's nothing too new or revolutionary, but it gets the job done. On top of the gameplay itself, you are showered in tons of options for both races and classes. In many ways, it feels like a MMO!

That's a good segway into the main appeal of this game: The online component. Neverwinter Nights was designed with being a smaller-scale MMO in mind, which allows for the player to create their own servers with their own game rules. Neverwinter Nights was one of the first games to encourage wide-scale mods and fan-made content, long before Bethesda ever did so with Elder Scrolls and Fallout.

Going online and joining all these random servers is probably some of the most fun I've ever had in an MMO. I met tons of people and even found some rare items online. Best of all, when I imported my online character into a single-player campaign I KEPT A BUNCH OF OP RARE ITEMS! NICE! Honestly, the online was immensely fun and made the game for me.

Now, I've gushed a lot about the game, but it's got problems. The graphics are rather bad and haven't aged well at all, being mostly unchanged since release. This doesn't bother me too much, since I'm used to most old RPGs from the time looking like garbage. It gives off an "early World of Warcraft" feel, and I dig it.

There's also the fact that the game doesn't bundle in all of the previously released plugins with the game. I get Darkness Over Daggerford and Tyrants of the Moonsea not being in there, but should all the other expansions not be included with the main release? These were plugins that have been available for a long time now and it's kind of unfair to sell them back to the player.

Also, there's a bit of a learning curve for people who are new to these kinds of RPGs. If you just pick any class/race combo and expect to be successful with it, then you're gonna have a bad time. There are also parts of the game that have not aged, especially some of the dialogue and voice-acting.

That being said, Neverwinter Nights has a magical charm to it. It's a game that evokes this strong sense of nostalgia, even if I never grew up playing it. I've only put 27 hours into this game so far, but I hope to get back into it soon and give it more of a shot. Just be warned that what you're getting is not a massive open-world action RPG like Skyrim or Fallout 4, but rather an old-school RPG adventure that's been updated to run better on modern computers. It's dated, somewhat janky, and lacking in a good main quest, but it gets the job done.

Let me start off by saying: This is a fantastic game. In fact, I'd argue it's one of my favorite MMORPGs of all time. Better than say Phantasy Star Online, which has been my MMO of choice since childhood. Warframe has great gameplay, varied things to do, a crap ton of customization, and is a "true" free-to-play. You can earn most things in the game simply by playing it, and it's always fun to do so.

It's also fun to play the game with friends, and it's always rewarding and fun. However, I had encountered a problem with the game that was so annoying that I felt I had to give this game a thumbs down. I'm talking about the infamous "UDP error" that tells you that certain ports aren't open. Because of this error, I have been unable to play online. Only on rare occasions does the online gameplay work, which is when the game is at its most fun.

I've tried various fixes in an attempt to get it to consisently work, at at most I can get it to work for a day before it bugs out again. I've reinstalled the game, I've restarted my computer, I've made exceptions in my firewall, etc. I also plan on resetting my router on the weekend to see if I can get the online to work. So far, my methods have only minor success. I hear the main way to get the game is to work is to "Port Forward" it, which may make one's computer vulnerable to hacking/viruses.

Another method I hear is to contact my internet service provider and have them manually open the ports. Now, I don't know about you but that's a long way to go to get the online portion of a game to work properly. Even with the error, I can still get messages and chat with people, and I still see other users when I go to Cetus. The game just won't let me play missions with other people, except on the aforementioned rare occasions.

I'd understand if this was an isolated incident, but I've read various forum posts that tell me that many other people have experienced this very same problem. I've also heard that the team applied some fixes that helped certain people run the game better, but only with certain computers. Sadly, the online functionality will just not work properly for me.

Usually, I don't play games for the online functionality alone. However, the community has been so nice and courteous to me, that I want to take my time to play individual missions with a ton of people I run across. I can't do that if the game won't let me. I also want support the developerse finanically by buying some of their packs, which again I can't do if portions of the game don't function properly.

The sad fact of the matter is that the game is more fun with other players to play with, and I can't do that due to a crappy error that's been in the game for several years now. Please, Digital Extremes, fix this problem. I love your guys' game, I love how you treat the community, and I love this created this fantastic experience of a game. If I can ever get the online functionality to work, or if DE somehow manages to patch this long-standing issue, then I will gladly both give a proper review of this game and finanically support it. There is no reason a game this massive and this popular should have an error that restricts online multiplayer, especially when not even private server MMOs have such a problem.

It's hard to give this game a thumbs down, but I feel I need to. I'll tell you my tale as to why I gave this game a thumbs down:

Just a couple days ago, this game finished downloading. My friend recommended it to me and it seemed interesting enough. I download it and I'm having a blast! The ability to mount all these different monsters and claim them as my sidekicks was enticing. The armor and weapon designs were fantastic, the voice acting and writing was surprisingly good, and cut-scenes were dynamic. Best of all, it's not a pay 2 win game!

Sure, the game wasn't anything new, and felt like most classic MMOs. Still, it was enjoyable and rewarding enough to keep my playing. Then I got to this one quest, one quest that ruined the experience for me. I was told to warp to a new area, which I was fine with. The problems began when it asked for five silver coins. Now coins are easy to come by, but it's an odd number to ask for a tutorial mission.

Still, I pay the fee and use the teleporter. However, as I'm teleporting, the game bugs out on the loading screen. I get stuck in an infinite loading screen, which eventually results in the game crashing. At first, I think it's just a bug. I've been dealing with minor bugs throughout my experience, so I thought this was no big deal. I sign back on, and I'm still stuck on the infinite loading screen. I restart the game, try it again, STILL STUCK!

At this point, my character is bugged. I can't play him, because I'm stuck on this infinite loading screen. I also have no idea of telling if my character made it to the location. If this bug is fixed and I found out that I'm still in the city and have to pay 5 silver again, then I'll probably never touch this game again.

I'd demand a refund, if I had actually bought anything that is. The annoying part is that I only had been playing the game for 4 hours, I hadn't even really got into the meat of the game: Collecting or chasing after rare mounts. Heck, I hadn't even started a guild yet, crafted anything, or gotten any rare weapons or armor yet.

If my character ever un-glitches, then I'll definitely get back into this game and play it more to give it a fair critique. As it stands, the game's bugs keep it from being as good as it could have been. I didn't understand why there were so many negative reviews until now, but now I understand.

tl;DR version: Play the game if you want, don't let me stop you. However, just be wary that the game is buggy. Don't go spending 100s of dollars on a character only for the game to break early on. Thankfully, I didn't do this, but I know some poor guy probably did.

Not trying to hitch a ride on the "Hating Fallout 4" bandwagon, but I just could not get into this game. It's definitely fun, the 20 hours I spent with (plus the counterless hours I've played of it over at my pal's house) but the problems with it are just way too numerous to be fun.

Pros:

-The game looks decent. It's not as graphically impressive as Skyrim, but it's got some nice visuals going on. Some of the character designs can also be quite nice at times.
-Power armor is badass (though not without flaws of its own) and is completely customizable. Running around a post-apocalypse in what is essentially a giant robot is some of the best parts of the game.
-The varied weapons and normal armor you can are awesome, especially due to how armor works in this when compared to previous Fallout games. Now you have body armor that comes in multiple parts (much like older Elder Scrolls games) that you can mix and match.
-The gunplay is faster and a lot more rewarding, likewise VATs is less overpowered than it has been in previous games.
-Some of the side-quests can be fun, even if there is an overabundance of fetch-quests. One of the best quests in the game involves you impersonating a fictional superhero modelled after golden-age comic books from the real world.
-You can have all your companions gather in one location. I know this was in New Vegas, but it's nice to have all your allies in one place once you befriend them.
-Hot women actually look hot in this game. I know this seems like a minor thing, but in the past few Fallout games there's be a lack of beautiful ladies. But man, there's some BABES in this game!

Cons:

-Bugs, bugs everywhere. I know glitches are common in most games, but this game is filled with more bugs than an Orkin commercial. You'll constantly encounter graphical glitches, glitches that break immersion, and game and quest-breaking bugs. I've encountered AT LEAST 4 quests that were bugged and that I couldn't finish. I had to use console commands to actually complete them. Say what you will about Oblivion or Skyrim, I very rarely encountered a broken quest. However, Fallout 4 has so damny many of them that it sometimes makes side-quests pointless. After all, what's the use in doing a side-quest if you put so much hard work into it only for to break during its final stage?

-Power Armor is too overpowered. It's easy to find enough cores to keep the suit powered up indefinitely, and it makes you nearly indestructible most of the time. Example: I was about to fight a Deathclaw in melee combat, wearing nothing but a full suit of Power Armor and a bat with spikes on it. Yes, the most deadly creature in the series was defeated by a makeshift Iron Man wielding a baseball bat.

-The story sucks. I know everyone's said this, but it needs reiteration. The story feels like it was written by a twelve year old, or by someone who didn't care. The writing is painfully boring, and most plot elements come out of nowhere without explanation. There are now androids that look exactly like humans, you can leap into people's minds as if it was the matrix, and now people can get psychic powers just by dosing themselves on drugs. And no, none of these new elements have been seen in the series before, or are given a good reason for being in this game.

-It barely mentions New Vegas. I know this is a nitpick, but hear me out. It's really petty of Bethesda to downright ignore New Vegas, especially due to it being a part of canon. Elements of the game are barely mentioned, relegated only to easter eggs. All of that interesting world-building and development from the last game was ignored, because Bethesda is petty and doesn't want to admit that a spinoff game made by the original developers of Fallout is more popular than their own iterations.

-The Creation Club, it's terrible. It shows up on your game's title screen, constantly taunting you and harassing you to buy something from it. The club itself downloads new content whether or not you ask for it, bloating your PC and making the download file larger. A lot of it feels like retextured items you'd get for free in mods, and some of them actually are.

-Does this game have a bad dialogue system? Your responses: A. Yes. B. No (Yes) C. Maybe (Yes) D. Sarcastic (Yes)

-Overpriced DLC. You know how Fallout New Vegas gave you what felt like an entirely new game with each expansion, with a new area to explore and crazy items to collect? Remember how each DLC had its own story, that was interconnected with the others to form a branching narrative? Remember how they were all fairly priced? Well, forget that! Most expansions are short, overpriced, barely add anything, and feel like they were thought up in a weekend. Probably doesn't help that cool ideas, such as the Ghoul Whale, are relegated to being an urban legend and a random skeleton you find underwater.

In Conclusion:
For sake of not driving myself nuts, I'm going to stop listing cons here. This game has way too many negatives, and I'd spend a fortnight listing them off. Now, should you buy the game? No. The game does on sale a lot, but buying just the game alone is a full 20 dollars. Which doesn't sound so bad, but if you want the game with all of its DLC installed, then you need to buy the Game of The Year Edition. Of course, the GOTY edition doesn't include any of the Creation Club content, so good luck hoping in vain for a "complete" game when you buy it.

Fallout 4 is best bought if it's on sale for a max of 10-15 bucks, and I mean for the Game of The Year Edition. The base game is so boring and unfulfilling that you will most likely never buy or enjoy the expansions. I know this game has been torn to shreds by fans the world over, and I know people will look at the amount of time I played this game and think I'm a troll. But I just wanted to get my opinions out there. This game is a scam, and no amount of Bethesda's inane pointless charts can change that. Go buy Wasteland 2 or Fallout New Vegas instead of this, if you want a really solid post-apocalyptic game.

Fallout 1: Cool grandfather with fun stories.
Fallout 2: Pretty cool dad who is also a nerd and has even more fun stories.
Fallout 3: Second cousin twice removed who lacks subtance in his life and tells mediocre stories.
Fallout 4: 10 year old nephew who tells the worst stores, is hard to be around, and wrecks all your stuff.
Fallout New Vegas: A really cool sibling who has your back, has a good story to tell, makes you feel like a hero, and treats you like a real person.

Man, I love this game! I remember playing Popeye on my friend's old Atari... Or maybe it was the Colecovision? Okay, I don't really remember the game all that well but I remember loving it.

What's not to love? You've got gators chasing you wanting to eat you, mysterious garage of wonders and old motherboards, and 50s style comics on a nearby table. It's a fun three-level game with an ever-increasing difficulty and an ending nobody has seen yet. That's right, you can be the first to see a kill-screen ending before EVERYONE ELSE. You'll get street cred. If you have to choose between 1 game featuring gators this year and you don't want to play Bayou Billy for the billionth time, get this game.

If this game has any problems is that the first level can be somewhat difficult for beginners. And I had a few other gripes, but with the game's newest patches a lot of the problems have been fixed. It's a game that's easy to pick up, difficult to master, and very fun and goofy.

Tl;dr version:

Gators. That is all. 19.45/10

It's got furries...

WHAT MORE COULD YOU ASK FOR?!

100/10 Would wear a fox suit again.

Short description: Baldur's Gate meets Pokemon.

Long description: Geneforge 3 is an amazing strategy RPG made mostly by one man: Kyle Vogel. Kyle makes most of the games for Spiderweb almost single-handedly, with occasional help from other devs. The Geneforge series is probably the best game series Kyle has ever made. Geneforge 3 is my favorite (And one of the few I've played so far) I bought the entire series less than a week ago and I do not regret it one bit. In this game, you play as a special wizard known as a "Shaper". You have the ability to forge monsters using your very mystical essence. You can sink points into specific stats to make one really strong monster, or just have a small batallion of weaker monsters in order to overwhelms your foes. The game is all about strategy, though sometimes rushing forwards without thinking will grant victory.

Geneforge lets you choose from three classes, which are your typical Warrior, Ranger, and Mage classes. The game also boasts an amazing story that will probably take you 40-50 hours to complete. As you can see, I still haven't completed it yet. I'm still on the second island and I'm probably only 25% done the game as this point. Spiderweb makes some massive games and they always have great stories throughout. Geneforge features rather dated graphics and no soundtrack though. Again, that's typical with Spiderweb games. The graphics may be meh, but the gameplay makes up for it. And despite lacking a soundtrack, the game makes up for it with some great ambient sounds whilst exploring.

I highly reccomend getting this game, it's currently only 4 dollars for the entire package. I reccomend starting with this one though, it's one of the less difficult of the 5 and is a good starting point. Summoning monsters and having them fight for you is the real draw of the game and you'll spend hours upon hours trying to master your Shaping skills and create the perfect minions. Just a warning, if you decide to break cannisters in order to attain more powers only break 6. Trust me, you'll thank me later. Enjoy, and if you like Geneforge I recomend trying Spiderweb's newest game, Avernum 2: Crystal Souls.

Played as an Egyptian robot-dog-man and shot a chicken with an arm-mounted laser gun.
19/10 Would laser-blast a chicken again.

This game is truly amazing, I freakin' love it! In my opinion, this is the only truly impressive game in the Fable series. In this game you play as The Hero Of Oakvale, a young child with dreams of greatness. The game sees you grow from a young punk, into a daring hero, dark warrior, or powerful mage. You can be anything you want in the game, you can even be a naked guy who runs around murdering people with a pic-axe! The game has fairly good graphics for the time, and I think they've aged fairly well.

This game's soundtrack is one of the best soundtracks I've heard in an RPG! The theme tune was done by the amazing Danny Elfman, the same guy who did the music for the Spiderman trilogy and The Simpsons. The game allows true character evolution, as your character will evolve depending upon what skills you choose to focus on and your chosen allignment. For example, if you focus on building your strength skills you will become a big muscly giant. If you focus on being a good guy, you will look like Super Saiyan Goku. The game allows you to be whatever you want, and that's what I enjoy.

The game does have problems though, and I'm going to avoid talking about the false advertising, because everyone has already bashed on it. One of the main annoyances I've had with the game is it's difficulty. It's way too easy, seriously! Five hours into the game and I'm able to bat everything away with zero effort! Almost all of the magic spells are overpowered and break the game. Do yourself a favor and avoid getting the Slow Time spell, it will kill any fun you can have. On top of that, there are various exploits in the game to get more powerful in a short amount of time. One such example is that the game features Ages potions, which give you a fair boost in EXP in a certain skill tree.

The problem? If you have your combat multiplier up high enough and drink the potion, you'll get mad EXP for almost nothing! I had my combat multiplier at 14 and drank a potion, and got 14800 EXP in the will category! Also, the story was fairly predictable at times, and some of the characters seemed flat. I never really liked Briar Rose all that much, and Maze was just lame to me. I'd like Guildmaster more if he didn't pipe random advice into my ear every five seconds. And I found that some sidequests were either really lame, or didn't off much reward. One such quest is one where I have to acquire for blue mushrooms to cure a sick child, but the reward wasn't really that great in the grand scheme of things.

Despite all that, I highly reccomend this game! If you're new to open-world RPGs and are on the fence of getting into these kinds of games, Fable would be a good starter for you. It isn't as large or as immerssive as Oblivon, Fallout 3, or Kingdoms Of Amalur, but you'll still get some bang out of your buck. Fable introduced me to the world of action RPGs, and I will never regret buying this game used back in the day. When this game goes on sale, I highly suggest picking it up. One final thing to note: This game does not have a difficulty slider, so you're stuck with the preset difficulty. Like said, it's easy but totally worth the price tag.